Turbulence
by BlueNeutrino
Summary: "Random chance dictates which people happened to be on the doomed flight. Random chance that determines who lives and who dies. If, indeed, chaos is truly random at all." There were other survivors of the crash of Oceanic Flight 815, whose lives were turbulently and violently thrown together by the disaster, but their tales have yet to be told. These are their stories.
1. Prologue

**Turbulence**

_**Prologue**_

Air is a fickle medium. It provides for us the oxygen needed to keep us alive; but also transports the scores of airborne diseases that can do us harm. It gives us weather: convection currents in the troposphere bringing rain to the continents and allowing the cycle of agriculture to go on, but it can also bring violent cyclones and tropical storms that wreak devastation. By manipulating air in the right way Bernoulli's Principle gives us the power to defy gravity. Air is what allows us to keep a plane in the sky, but is also what can bring it crashing down.

Just one random event disrupting the smooth flow of nitrogen and oxygen molecules over the wings of a plane can cause the aircraft to falter. Buffets of air attack its streamlined surfaces, forming turbulent whorls around the ailerons and disturbing the laminar currents so vital for lift.

Sometimes it's possible to recover. Sometimes it isn't. Eddies and vortices of gas flood the areas of low pressure. Airspeed declines. The forces opposing the plane overpower its thrust, decreasing its critical angle of attack. The plane's inclination tilts, and pockets of air turbulence form beneath its wings. Then it stalls. Gravity reaches up to take back the flying machine that defied it, the laws of physics suddenly switching allegiances to drag the plane back down instead of keeping it in the sky. The aircraft begins to plummet: a result of the random motion of millions of tiny particles that by a random event became embroiled in chaos.

Inside the aircraft, passengers feel it: the violent shaking of the fuselage and the sudden changes in pressure that make the fluid in their ears pop. Panic begins. Tiny specks of life, caught 37 000 feet above the surface of their planet, about to be snuffed out.

Outside, particles of air continue to flow in disorder around the metal structure. They collide with each other, each one affecting the motion of the others like a miniscule cue ball smashing into the triangle of reds. Their paths are impossible to predict, the microscopic chaotic effects building up to impact the particles' surroundings on a macroscopic level. Random chance determines their motion.

Random chance that decides which particle should hit where at which instant, happening to be in such a way that the turbulent forces of air are sufficient to overpower the plane. Random chance dictates which people happened to be on the doomed flight, their lives coalescing and colliding at this one pivotal event as the plane falls thousands of feet to the earth. Random chance that determines who lives and who dies.

If, indeed, chaos is truly random at all.


	2. Gaily

**A/N: I eventually got round to making a start on this now that I've got enough character submissions. I've decided I'm going to start off by just focussing on one character at a time, and for this chapter it's going to be queengean's character, Abigail. Everybody else who already submitted a character either by PM or forum post will get their own chapter at some point, but I'm not taking any more submissions so don't send me any and especially don't do so in the reviews. That's against site rules.  
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**If you want to see the character list it's on the forums that are linked to in my profile, or if you'd prefer it to be a surprise who the characters and what their stories are then just keep reading.  
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**Disclaimer: I don't own Lost and the lovely people who submitted characters own the OC's. **

_**Chapter One – Gaily**_

Noise. The world was suddenly full of it: noise and motion that roared in her ears and spun her round violently, furious and powerful as if it were trying to overwhelm her remaining senses to compensate for her lack of sight. People were screaming. She could feel cold, harsh air rushing past her; hear the clanging of metal being violently wrenched apart. Panic flared up inside her, the sickening sensation of terror in the pit of her stomach adding to the sensory bombardment from the external stimuli. Within nanoseconds she realised that this wasn't just the period of slight turbulence the captain had announced over the intercom: this was full on engine failure. The plane was crashing.

For a moment she refused to believe it: this couldn't be happening; it was just another one of her all too vivid nightmares, and she'd be awake and safe in her bed long before the plane hit the ground. But she knew if it was a nightmare then she'd at least be able to see some kind of chaotic colours or shapes that her mind constructed for her. Instead, everything was black.

Her mind blanked out in panic as she tried to remember what it was they were supposed to do in the event of an emergency. Brace for impact? Reach for their oxygen masks? But what good would that do if the plane was already plummeting towards the ocean thousands of feet below? She could feel it, falling faster and faster, accelerating every second with the air pressure building so fast it was making her nauseous. Fighting through the waves of fear flooding her brain and threatening to overwhelm her, Abigail tried desperately to think. Only one uncertain thought of what to do managed to form coherently in her mind: lifejackets. They were under the seat.

Desperately, Gaily's hands reached under the seat for the tab that would allow her to release the lifejacket, her panic intensifying as she realised her clumsy fingers couldn't find it. She braced her feet against the floor to resist the violent motion of the plane, hoping to steady her hands, but felt another wave of fear as she realised her seatbelt was restraining her. She was strapped to the seat, no lifejacket, and if they went and crashed in the ocean she was going to be stuck and unable to get out...

Irrationally, Gaily fumbled with her seatbelt to try and get it off, panic driving her frantic need to feel as though she had a means of escape. Again she tried for the lifejacket, leaning forward for a better reach, but as she shifted her weight the motion of the plane suddenly flung her from her seat altogether. The soles of her shoes were no longer in contact with anything, and her sense of balance told her that somehow the world had turned upside down.

Oddly, the only thought that had chance to flash through her brain was, _If I were on the opposite side of the planet I'd be the right way up, _before she felt her head collide with something and everything faded into stillness and silence.

-oOo-

Slowly, Gaily tried to sit herself up as faint sounds and sensations gradually worked their way back into her consciousness. Every inch of her hurt, and with every passing second the pain was only getting worse. What had happened? Oh yeah, that was it. The plane had crashed. Yet somehow, she was still alive. She wasn't sure if she should consider that a miracle or not.

Reaching up, she put a hand to her head and felt that her custom made sunglasses had gone. Well, that was inconvenient. Feeling around, she realised that her cane didn't seem to be anywhere nearby either, but instead her hands sank into wet sand beneath her. That meant she was on land, then. Well, it was certainly better than crashing into the sea at any rate, but she still would have preferred that they hadn't crashed at all. At that thought she let out a slight giggle, wondering how she could be viewing this whole thing as just a minor inconvenience. Perhaps she was in shock.

Around her she could still hear the shouts and screams of the other survivors, and the roar of what she assumed must be one of the plane's engines that was still futilely turning, not realising it wasn't even attached to anything remotely capable of flying anymore. She made a few clicking noises with her tongue, hoping to use echo location to get a better idea of the layout of her surroundings, but the other noises were too loud and she was still too disoriented for it to be much use.

Getting gingerly to her feet, she allowed herself to stand for a few moments before turning round in a steady circle to try and work out which way was inland and which way was out to sea. She paused in her turning as she felt the warm rays of sunlight falling directly on her face, and then took a couple of slow paces forward. The sand beneath her feet seemed to be wetter and more yielding, which perhaps meant the sea lay in that direction. Just as she was considering that, there was the sudden sound of an explosion from somewhere off to her right and she jumped, another panic driven rush of adrenaline coursing through her before she realised she was still alive and that it must have been the remaining engine blowing up. That must mean the wreck of the plane was somewhere in that direction then.

She turned around again and began to head towards it, assuming that must be where most of other survivors would be, but she promptly tripped over an uneven object lying on the ground and collapsed onto the sand beside it. Muttering a curse and thinking how much easier this would be if she could just find her cane, Gaily got to her knees and felt for the object to try and work out how to navigate her way around it. As her hands came into contact with a soft, yielding shape that appeared to be emanating heat and was covered in fabric, she felt slightly sick as she realised it must be a body. She was just slowly backing off in order to step around it when she suddenly felt it move underneath her. There was the sound of someone gasping and groaning, and then she heard a masculine voice mutter, "What the hell happened?"

**A/N: Sorry that it's a bit short, but I have a lot of stories that I'm working on at the moment and I can't devote a great deal of time to each of them.**

**Gaily is partly influenced by a blind character from the **_**Bones **_**episode 'The Science in the Physicist' who used echo location to find his way around and had custom made glasses that made clicking noises for him. It also made for a rather hilarious scene at the end of the episode where he accidentally punched Booth instead of the murderer.**

**Hope you liked the start, and I will try and get round to writing about the other characters ASAP. Please review!**


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